no way to compare when less than two revisions

Differences

This shows you the differences between two versions of the page.

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
+====== PadStart(text, pad_char, total_len) ======
+Category:  Text function
+\\
+=====Description=====
+This function pads the beginning of //text// with //pad_char// up to a total length defined by //total_len//.
+\\
+=====Use cases=====
+This function is useful for creating text values from numbers that require leading zeros.
+Create fixed width datasets by padding blank spaces to the front of values in each column.
+\\
+=====Arguments=====
+^Argument^Type^Description^
+|text|Text|The text value to be padded.|
+|pad_char|Text (a single character)|The character to append to the start of //text// repeatedly until the total string length of //total_len// is reached.|
+|total_len|Number|The total length of the result string including //text// plus all repeated instances of //pad_text//.|
+**Return value type:** Text
+\\
+=====Remarks=====
+//text// and //pad_char// are implicitly converted to text values if required.
+Entering a value for //pad_char// longer than a single character results in an error message.
+Entering a value for //total_len// equal to or less than the length of //text// simply returns the value of //text//.
+\\
+=====Examples=====
+  padstart('99', '0', 5) = '00099'
+  padstart('1000', '0', 3) = '1000'  //Result length entered (3) is less than the length of '1000' (4)
+Create a fixed-width dataset from [Col1], [Col2] and [Col3] where [Col1] must be 5 characters wide, [Col2] must be 20 characters wide, and [Col3] must be 12 characters wide:
+  padstart([Col1], ' ', 5)
+  padstart([Col2], ' ', 20)
+  padstart([Col3], ' ', 12)
+\\
+===== See also =====
+  * [[syntax:functions:padend|PadEnd(text, pad_char, total_len)]]